Tanchum on Natural Gas Pipeline Access For Turkey

Israel can make an important contribution to Turkey’s effort to become less dependent on Russian natural gas imports. The various proposals for an undersea pipeline from Israel’s offshore Leviathan call for Israel initially to export 8-10 billion cubic meters annually. This volume is equivalent to about 17-20 percent of Turkey’s 2014 natural gas imports. Thus, natural gas imports from Israel would represent a significant diversification of Turkey’s natural gas supply mix. To put it in perspective, the proposed initial export volume of Israeli gas is equivalent to 29-37 percent of the total volume that Turkey imported from Russia in 2014.